In the past decade a growing interest has evolved for using computers for generating forms. Forms have been and always will represent a communications metaphor that document many different types of transactions. Whether transactions happen with or without computers, forms are everywhere. Most forms are preprinted, created and supplied by external form suppliers. The Business Forms Management Association estimates that businesses spend between $6 and $8 billion dollars a year to create and print preprinted forms. Industry pundits estimate that businesses spend as much as twenty times that amount storing, managing and printing forms.
The process for generating a form is typically a tedious one. When the form finally receives final approval and goes on to an outside printer, it gets printed, distributed and hundreds of thousands of copies of the form are inventoried into a paper storage. Each time the form undergoes modification, the process of approval and storage starts all over again.
In an effort to economize the process of generating forms, electronic form software has been developed. Such software is another example of the personal computer's rapid displacement of functions previously done on expensive, dedicated, single-purpose types of business equipment, such as electronic publishing and business presentation graphics. Electronic forms are defined as computer-generated forms that incorporate graphics which exist independent of variable data and can be generated on demand. Electronic form software provides individuals with an alternative to using expensive phototypesetting equipment, with the additional benefit of adding speed and accuracy.
Electronic forms represent significant cost savings to businesses. When compared to the costs of designing and completing preprinted forms, electronic forms save businesses money; they require no physical space, they are easily revised (reducing waste of obsolete forms), and they often are printed on cut sheet paper. The costs of using computer-generated forms on cut sheet paper is less than purchasing preprinted forms. The cost of completing forms, estimated to be as much as twenty times the cost of the form, will be reduced by having built-in calculations and logic checking.
Although electronic forms are stored in computers, the user can do many things with electronic forms that are now done on preprinted forms; they can be filled in, approved, filed, and printed. The current packages, however, are limited in their application because these packages are really just typing programs for enabling a user to efficiently fill in and have neatly typed up a form.
Another type of form package enables a designer to design a form on screen and save it for reuse, or to scan in an existing paper form, which is then displayed on screen for completion. The advantage of these form packages is the ability to produce the electronic form to the exact specifications of the preprinted form, easing the user transition to the electronic form by providing the same "look" to the electronic form. Many of these form packages result in intelligent forms or smart forms. Intelligent forms generally imply forms that are interactive in numerical intelligence. In contrast to "dead forms", these forms will accept user entries, compute values and may even link values or amounts to other forms. The sophistication of the user entry acceptance (i.e. formatting, error checking, etc.) and the sophistication of computation and linking may vary considerably across different form packages.
A significant design issue in form generation with regard to these existing packages is the level of flexibility that the package has in editing or revising the form after a layout has been created. Stated differently, even if a form package has tackled the complex issues of computations, linking, interfacing with the database, etc., the ability of the package to edit or revise the layout of the form is a pressing issue in determining the value of an electronic form generation package. The issue boils down to whether a form once created can be easily changed, for example, by deleting a field, making a field smaller, making a field larger, moving a field, all while the rest of the form automatically adjusts to accommodate the change.
To date, no package has incorporated a concept of "graphics intelligence" to enable a system to dynamically adjust and accommodate for changes in the form. Graphics intelligence is a type of intelligence in form creation which enables all of the elements within a form to "understand" their positional relationships vis-a-vis each other. Hence, changes made to element size, text font, text size, placement, shape, etc., may cause other portions of the form to readjust, stretch, move over, or realign to positionally accommodate the change while maintaining the overall integrity or "basic look" of the form. By contrast, in existing form packages, when certain changes in layout are made, subsequent manual adjustments of other individual elements in the form may be required to fit the new design. Without incorporating graphics intelligence, such changes to the graphic layout of the form require a designer to redraw portions of the form and in some circumstances to redraw the entire form.